Stir Of Echoes: The Homecoming Movie
Storyline
TAGLINES PLOT SUMMARY
Ted Cogan is a U.S. soldier fighting in Iraq when he is injured in an explosion during an attack that left an innocent Iraqi family dead, and him comatose with a head wound. Upon awakening, Ted returns to his home in Chicago and after he has encounters of increasingly frightening visions of dead people, including a burned victim, Ted begins to realize that his injury has unlocked some gift of clairvoyance which he is targeted by ghosts seeking his help. As Ted tries to unlock the mystery of one, his worried and skeptic wife Molly, and teenage son Max, hinder his quest for the truth in the matter, which may lay closer than Ted thinks.
| Rob Lowe | Ted Cogan |
| Marnie McPhail | Molly Cogan |
| Ben Lewis | Max Cogan |
| Tatiana Maslany | Sammi |
| Shawn Roberts | Luke |
| Vik Sahay | Farzan |
| Colin Williams | Drexel |
| Pj Lazic | Nunez |
| Elias Zarou | Iraqi Officer |
| Nicholas Carella | Kablinsky |
| Cristine Prosperi | Iraqi Girl |
| Jason Mercury | Translator |
| Bill Lake | Colonel |
| Neil Crone | Gary |
| Katya Gardner | April |
| Ernie Barbarash |
4.50 out of 10 (242 votes)
Visitor Reviews
A surprisingly intelligent thriller
posted on 30 May 2009When coming across a direct to DVD sequel of a mainstream horror or sci fi movie movie, usually one cannot be blamed for staying away. The rental stores are full of such sequels that are abysmal due to poor acting, poor special effects, and most of all poor directing. One will both waste their time and their money trying to enjoy such nonsense.Imagine the surprise when Stir of Echoes: The Homecoming, yes a sequel to a mainstream horror movie, proves itself to be a surprisingly intelligent thriller. The Homecoming won't win any awards but it does hold its own and is able to give a convincing story.Captain Ted Cogan (Rob Lowe) holds himself responsible for the death of an Iraqi family during his tour of duty. Like many veterans, Ted only wants to return home to his family and forget the war so that he can go back to the life he once knew. The problem is that such memories never fade easily and home is never the same once you have been gone for so long. Ted's wife Molly (Marnie McPhail) and son Max (Ben Lewis) find that the husband and father they once knew is a different man.However, something else haunts Ted. A series of graphic images of those who died in Iraq, including strange visions of what appear to be the future, stalk Ted. While he believes it to be mere post traumatic stress disorder, it soon becomes clear that something else is going on and that Ted is facing a different kind of ghost then he expected. While his family falls apart around him, Ted realizes that if he is to keep his sanity then he needs to solve the mystery of what is happening.Much like the previous Stir of Echoes, a spirit demands vengeance and unless that vengeance is fulfilled then that spirit will take its anger out on whoever it can reach. The truth, however, is more horrific than even Ted could imagine and will force him to make the most difficult choice in his life. The ghost isn't one that followed him from Iraq. The truth is that the ghost wants vengeance against Max for a crime he committed......Stir of Echoes Homecoming doesn't rely on gore to push the horror that Ted is experiencing. Instead it uses dialog and mood setting to give the feeling of Ted's isolation and confusion. Not the best movie but it is a good sequel that shows the original idea of Stir of Echoes is still interesting.7/10
Controversial
posted on 18 May 2009This movie was exceptionally well done for a Sci-Fi original movie, and in my opinion a very controversial one as well, considering the fact it deals with the current war in Iraq.To begin with a man named Ted Cogan (rob lowe) and other soldiers kill a van full of people in Iraq creating a huge conflict, thus sending Ted and his men back home. When he arrives back to his house he starts seeing visions of the victims that were killed in the van. Finally, when all his buttons have been pushed Ted decides to try and find out why this is happening to him and what all the symbolic occurrences taking place really mean.Now, here's the part that I found rather controversial, upsetting and at the same time sickening. I am myself an American, but during the part when Ted's son and two other of his friends kill what they believe to be an Iraqi citizen in the country side I felt ashamed to call myself American. Although people may think that this doesn't happen, it does. Maybe what bothered me about this scene the most was the brutality behind the murder. The beating, the dousing of alcohol, the setting him on fire, the locking him in a dumpster to burn so he can't get out, all of this seemed to be so hostile that I felt completely repulsed. And then there's the part of the mother, Molly. She confides in her husband that although this was horrible, she doesn't want her son to be charged with this crime and she asks her husband how they can cover it up.All and all, the movie itself was good and entertaining, it was just the last fifteen minutes or so that bothered me. People may agree with me, or may not agree with me, either way it doesn't affect me. I just wanted to voice my opinion about what I found to be a rather disturbing sequence of events in the movie I just watched.
Bad, boring, and bad
posted on 20 Sep 2008This is why people hate sequels. Rob Lowes is a good actor. He gets involved in these movies that just suck… like this one. The ghost in this lame sequel is trying to tell him something. Spoiler; it's telling him that his son along with friends killed him because they thought he was an Arab that hated America… based of course on his rude demeanor and tone towards American soldiers, easy mistake.This movie was made by obvious liberals because a conservative republican would be pleased that an American stuck up for their country and said hey, you want to mess with my land and talk crap about our soldiers… well F-you. They should make a movie praising Americans for sticking up for themselves for once instead of preachy junk like this. The a-hole gets killed and then has the audacity to haunt the boy's father, (Lowe). At the end his son goes to jail and his wife gets shot and killed, while Lowes character seems to be placed into an asylum. Gee nice message thrown in my face to be tolerant of others. F uck tolerance! Whatever happened to America being home of the brave?By the way... I'm not some racist redneck, I hate everyone equally
A little disappointing sequel
posted on 25 Apr 2008The first Stir of Echoes is IMO the most underrated horror film ever. Had it not came out at the same time as The Sixth Sense maybe it would have done better, but sometimes the little known gems are the best. Heard about the sequel a while back ago, and was kinda excited. Disappointed when I heard it wasn't getting a theatrical release, but I have come to find out that these little know gems do get released STD.Unfortunately, I wasn't feeling this movie. First of all, is it just me or did it seem very fast paced? I like fast paced, but not to fast that it feels like the movie is just an hour long or shorter. And the creepiness of the first movie was certainly missing here. And wow, what a downgrade music wise. From the classic Rolling Stones song "Paint it Black" (albeit it was a cover version, but I like any version of that song) to some rap song? I know that song kinda had to do with what was happening, but rap? Bleh! And the twist wasn't quite too shocking that it had me going "no way!"And this just did not feel at all like a Stir of Echoes sequel at all to me. OK, we had Jake from the first movie all grown up. How long ago were the events of the first movie? Or are we still at war 20 or 30 years in the future (man I hope not)? And why no mention of his dad? But at least they brought back the OJ drinking.Overall, it wasn't a bad movie, but many miles away from the underrated first.
Flawed But Watchable Sequel.
posted on 18 Mar 2008In "Stir Of Echoes", the always watchable Kevin Bacon played a man who began to see restless spirits after being hypnotised at a party and subsequently uncovered a terrible crime. "Stir Of Echoes: The Homecoming" utilises this premise and gives it a twist. Our main character here is U.S Patrol Captain Ted Cogan who is forced to give the order which leads to the death of a family in Iraq. He is also wounded and falls into a coma which - much like the hypnosis from the first movie - turns him into a 'receiver', able to see the ghosts around him."Stir Of Echoes: The Homecoming" uses the horror genre to comment on the situation in Iraq and its effect on Americans back home. For example, early in the story we have a party in which one of Cogan's neighbours makes a racist joke which results in laughter from some and an outburst of anger from Cogan. It's an interesting idea but, unfortunately, the script is not quite strong enough to quite carry it off. There's a good idea at work here but the movie comes off as far too preachy in places for its own good.The horror aspects are well done and very interesting. As the ghosts haunting Cogan become more frustrated and aggressive, their attacks become increasingly more violent. Much like Bacon's character in the first movie, Cogan also experiences various hallucinations related to future events. I certainly can't fault the work of director Ernie Barbarish who manages to stretch a small budget out so the movie looks great.If I had to point out the areas where this movie fails, the most obvious area is the casting of Rob Lowe as Cogan. It would be hard for any actor to follow Kevin Bacon but Lowe appears to sleepwalk through most of the movie. There are moments when you glimpse him come alive but, for the most part, he seems to be there just to pick up his money which is a shame. The second failing of the movie comes with its conclusion which simply didn't sit right with me at all.Strangely, Bacon's son from the original "Stir Of Echoes" appears in a cameo role in this movie but has been greatly aged which suggests that the sequel takes place many years later. Although it was a nice way to tie the two movies together, this decision ultimately baffled me.Despite its flaws, its still a watchable movie. If you enjoyed the first movie, then you might still enjoy "Stir Of Echoes: The Homecoming" if you can forgive its sledgehammer approach to racism and the current situation in Iraq. Unfortunately, if you've seen the first movie then you'll also probably realise where the story is going due to certain similarities in its plot. Is it worth purchasing on DVD? No. Is it worth a rental? Well, if you like supernatural horror movies then there are certainly worse ways to spend an hour and a half.
Like most sequels pretty average one
posted on 17 Feb 2008I really liked the first "Stir of echoes" movie and after reading some bashing here I thought I'd also give the second a try because too much praise and bashing indicates that its most of the time way out of line... and once again I was right.The movie is wrapped around a more up to date story revolving around an Iraq Soldier having to deal with his wrong decisions leading to an Iraqi family's death and his coming home to face demons which soon turn out not to be those you expect. Of course the basic premise from here on is 100% the same as in the first movie. Man has dreams and hallucinations and tries to uncover what they are about. Where in the first part hypnotizing triggered the events here its the war trauma which fits the explanation of the soldier in the first movie (they even picked back up his "X-Ray eyes" line).I think the movie is decent for a sequel... all the bashing about the acting and effects and bad story are pretty much over the top. But I give you that its at times annoying to watch the same ideas from Part1 recycled in a different environment and that the ending really sucks bad. Where the first part gave some kind of resolution this one doesn't... its real disappointing to have such a clichéd "happy Hollywood ending" (considering the ghosts) and everything else being a mess of storytelling. You can see they went for a drama like the kid in Part1 having to deal with the voices for life but here it just falls apart and pretty much left me cold when the credits rolled.Anyway I have seen far worse... and what really makes me smile is that I now know why there are such harsh reactions on the movie. There is not much positive left on the American side of glory at the end and it seems that some of the guys here are too damn brainwashed to face that there is also another point of view possible than the anti-Arab U.S. propaganda that is all over the place. Come on guys... comparing this movie to anti-semitic propaganda and Jud Suss is a joke. With hundred percent of the Nazis Jud Suss image stuck to Muslims in dozens of U.S. Blockbusters in best "Der Stuermer" manner. Look at the imagery and compare to Jud Suss and maybe you realize how damn brainwashed you are that you can't even face a movie about the negative sides without complaining. Now that the Russians are not the bad guys, the Muslims are... and as soon as someone depicts holy America as bad its propaganda of course. Get a life and look in the mirror for a difference... and after all its just a movie. If you are angry about it it must have had some kind of impact... and thats much more than most of todays movies even come near to achieve. Time to face your demons!
As good a sequel as they could come up with.
posted on 30 Jan 2008Direct to DVD sequel to the original KEVIN BACON chiller, casts ROB LOWE as an American Soldier who along with his comrades is fighting in Iraq & whom accidentally kills an Iraqi family driving in a van who mistakenly go through a check point when ordered to stop. After an ambush, he awakens two weeks later & returns back home where unfortunately for him, he begins to see ghosts, horribly burned ghosts that for some reason or another is trying to make contact with him & are seemingly determined to hurt his family & drive him insane, however when he tries to figure out what they want from him he discovers some dark secrets that will shatter his life & that of his family forever, should the ghosts allow them to live that is...STIR OF ECHOS 2: THE HOMECOMING surprisingly turned out to be a pretty decent sequel, that while nowhere near as scary, or suspenseful as the original, still managed to provide a few creepy moments of it's own & some pretty interesting plot twists. ROB LOWE was great as the hero of the movie & the rest of the cast also performed pretty good. The direction was well handled & the make-up effects are also very well done. Fans who enjoyed the first however are advised not to go into this sequel expecting it to top the original, because if you go into it expecting it to beat out the first, you'll be extremely disappointed, since Echoes 2 comes nowhere close to doing so, however non demanding fans will no doubt find plenty to like. The films plot twists are neat & surprising much like the originals & the pacing although slow at times, moves at a fair pace throughout most of the film. Definitely recommended to fans of the first. Like I said don't expect it to top the original & you just may like it, I know I did.*** stars
A Supernatural Tale of Prejudice and Justice
posted on 20 Oct 2007During the invasion of Iraq, the National Guard Commander Ted Cogan (Rob Lowe) sees a van speeding up against his site without respecting the warning plates. He orders his men to fire, and later he discovers that in the van there was an Iraqi family. He tries to save a young girl from the fire, but the vehicle explodes and his group is attacked; he enters in coma severely wounded and his friend and neighbor dies. When Ted recovers, he returns home to meet his family, but he is increasingly haunted by ghosts of dead people, premonitions and guilty complex for the death of the innocent family. He seeks medical support but his financial situation does not allow him to pay for a treatment and the government denies helping him. However, one ghost gives the name of Jake Witzky (Zachary Bennett), who tells him to find out what the spirit demands from him. When his son Max (Ben Lewis) is severely wounded in a car crash where his girlfriend Sammi (Tatiana Maslany) and their friend Luke (Shawn Roberts) die, Ted discovers the wish of justice of the tormented soul and he tries to do the right thing.The ghost story "Stir of Echoes: The Homecoming" is a surprisingly good and dramatic tale of prejudice and justice. Rob Lowe gives a solid performance in the role of a man that feels the effects of a senseless invasion, earning a medal but no financial or medical support in his homecoming, living with the remorse for a wrong order in a moment of stress in a foreign and hostile country. The bigotry of his neighbors upsets him until his final discovery of the despicable act of his son and his friends. This supernatural story is certainly polemic for many, but I liked it, specially the unexpected twist with the true reason for the spirit's revenge. My vote is seven.Title (Brazil): "Ecos do Além 2" ("Echoes from Beyond 2")
I hope some day you would forgive me
posted on 12 Sep 2007***SPOILERS*** Highly inflammatory made for TV movie showing how the present war in Iraq as well as in Afghanistan effects us all here at home as well as on the battlefield of those two war torn and embattled country's.The film "Stir of Echoes: The Homecoming" starts out like your typical war film with an attack on a van that runs a road block in Iraq. The person in charge of the US patrol Capt. Ted Cogan, Rob Lowe, orders a warning shot but his order doesn't go through to the tank commander. This results is a full scale one sided fire fight where everyone in the van gets roasted alive when it's hit in the gas tank by a volley of rifle shots. The results of the attack on the van led to a real Iraqi insurgents attack on the US Army unite with both Capt. Cogan and one of his men the units medic Kabinsky, Nicholas Carella, badly wounded in the shootout; It later turns that Capt. Cogan survived but Kabinsky didn't.Recovering back home the now discharged from the US military Ted Cogan finds out that his actions resulted in some half dozen innocent Iraqi civilians being killed including a 12 year-old girl that he and Kabinsky desperately tried to save. It's then when Cogan starts to get these intense headaches and hallucinations where he relives the horrors that he went through in Iraq. Back home Cogan finds that everything that he left behind isn't what it used to be with his son Max,Ben Lewis, becoming very resentful and even hateful of all persons of Arabic decent as well as taking up smoking and drinking. Later going to see his neighbor April, Katya Gardner, Cogan is shocked to both find her husband was not only killed in Iraq but savagely decapitated! Cogan finds April is so distraught over her husbands brutal death that he had to take a .45 handgun from her to keep April from blowing her brains out.Th film wastes a lot of time in Ted Cogan going through a number of strange and almost unnecessary mental breakdowns and mind-bending hallucinations but when it gets to the real reason for what's unknowingly on his mind it more then makes up for that defect. We and Ted are drawn to this place some two hours drive from his home and it's there that he finds out what's really driving him insane and it has nothing to do with what he did in Iarq! Ted's deteriorating mental condition does in fact have everything to do with what people here in the states see on TV and read in the newspapers about that war and how they in their own way try to fight it here back home!Very unusual war movie that's made at a time that the war that it depicts is still going on. Ted who by being in the war and suffering from it's affects is by far more understanding then those who aren't about the people, basically Iraqis, who are said to be his and Americas mortal enemies. The ending is almost too hard to watch in that it turns people here at home who are effected by the war in Iraq into the monsters, like Al-Quida and the Taliban, that we depict our enemies as being.Besides the aforementioned cast there's also Mannie McPhail as Molly Cogan who ends up not only losing her husband Ted who ends up in a mental institution from the criminally insane but her son Max, in how what happened to his father affected him, as well as her life! All this because of a war being fought some 7,000 miles away on the other side of the globe that, with what we now know, should't have been fought at all!
Barely better sequel to a rather decent original
posted on 18 Aug 2009"Stir of Echoes: The Homecoming" is a mildly disappointing but decent sequel.**SPOILERS**Injured in battle, Ted Cogan, (Rob Lowe) returns home from the war in Iraq and immediately puts off wife Molly, (Marnie McPhail) and son Max, (Ben Lewis) by his militaristic attitude. The more time he spends at home, the more he's tormented by nightmarish visions and dreams about an incident during the war involving a small girl. As they get more frequent in terms of frequency and intensity, he is determined to find out the cause of the attacks. When his family become targets, he finds that the true cause of the attacks is based around an similar incident between his family and that the ghost of that incident, rather than the one from the War, is intent on hurting him and he must stop it before it hurts more than just his family.The Good News: This here was decent enough when it counted. The main factor with this one is the ghostly visions in here being down-right creepy at times. Mixed along with the hallucinations and the sightings, these here are the highlight of the film with ease. From the encounter in the kitchen, the burnt ghost reaching out for him that comes from out-of-nowhere scoring a massive shock. The encounter with the widow is just as fantastic, being even better with the added bonus of the shocking, brutal kill to wrap it all in a great package. There's even more fantastic, fun encounters in here, with the Veteran's Hospital series standing out nicely with it's myriad of different sequences and tense moments. These are mostly helped out by the fact that the ghosts in here look fantastic, with the burnt flesh, distorted features, smoldering heaps of flesh and tattered clothes make for tons of great scenes with the ghosts. This one also has a fairly impressive action scene that kicks the film off, as the different traps, shootout and massive explosions that go off in the sequence are a lot of fun and definitely do a lot to make the film rather enjoyable. The last plus here is the fact that there's some really nice blood and gore in here, even if not all of them are deaths. From the views of the burnt corpses, which look suitably gruesome and graphic, there's a gunshot that blows half the victim's head off, one has words burned into their arm with a lighter, one shows the scars of being beaten and pummeled with a tire-iron and another couple are set graphically set on fire, complete with full-body burns. These here are the film's only real good points.The Bad News: There was a couple flaws with this one that managed to hold it down. One of the biggest issue here is that the film manages to get heavily bogged down in politics and world events, especially towards the end. Despite it being something that might turn some off on sheer principle, the fact that it consistently does it by beating us over the head about the War and it's affects on those not directly involved make for some incredibly tough and irritating viewing at times. The severity of how it's beaten down is really where it gets it's really aggravating, because it drops the ghost angle to throw in the angle with the citizen seeking retribution for the political-based attack. These are almost as bad as the early scenes of the family drama and tension, which isn't that good and does the exact same thing, serve no purpose being there and have a bunch of rather irritating factors about them that can easily be left out without any consequences. These scenes are just aggravating to sit through and don't belong in the film. The film also manages to score a couple of rather lame ghost attacks as well, some of which don't even make sense. The entire encounter at the psychic's hotel makes no sense, there's the malfunctioning appliances that showcases an unmentioned-and-unnecessary power of moving objects around when it should really be about their interaction with each other and in effect really neutering the whole thing. The last flaw here is the entire middle segment, which features no ghost action at all. Mixed between the need to deliver the back-story about the events as they're going on, the most irritating elements of the family-drama and the first hints of the political tension, it has a lot of down-time and really shouldn't be. All told, these are the film's flaws.The Final Verdict: While it's not entirely perfect, it's good enough to good parts to warrant a look at the very least. Really only recommended to those who liked the original or are interested in this who can overlook the flaws, while those who are turned off by the flaws are advised to seek caution with this one.Rated R: Graphic Language and Graphic Violence